Patients with high blood pressure should be prescribed a combination drug
because it is 25 per cent more effective than the traditional treatment,
researchers have discovered.

The results "break the mould" for treating high blood pressure and are likely to change the way doctors treat the condition, the Cambridge University researchers said.

Patients with very high blood pressure - a major risk factor for heart attacks and strokes - often need more than one drug over a period of months to control it.

However the new study found it is best to start treatment with two medicines together as this reduces blood pressure by 25 per cent compared to using one drug at a time.

This results in much faster and more effective control of blood pressure, with fewer side effects, they said.

Professor Morris Brown, from Cambridge University, who led the trial, said: "The Accelerate study breaks the mould for treating hypertension (high blood pressure). Most patients can now be prescribed a single combination pill and know that they are optimally protected from strokes and heart attacks."

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Professor Bryan Williams, from the British Hypertension Society, said: "This study is important and the findings could change the way we approach the treatment of high blood pressure."

The research, which involved 1,250 patients with high blood pressure, is published in an early online edition of The Lancet medical journal.

It shows that starting treatment with the two drugs aliskiren and amlodipine in a combination pill reduced blood pressure on average by 25 per cent more than one drug.

The scientists suspect taking the drugs in series allows the body to neutralise each of them in turn. Having them together may prevent this from happening.

Professor Jeremy Pearson, associate medical director at the British Heart Foundation, said: “This study adds significantly to the evidence that starting treatment for patients with high blood pressure with two medicines rather than one is safe, and more effective than waiting to add the second medicine later.

“Good control of blood pressure is still hard to achieve in many patients. So the BHF is currently funding follow-up trials to this research that will find out the best way to treat patients whose hypertension is still poorly controlled with two drugs, and who need extra medicines.”

Almost 10 million people in the UK are believed to have high blood pressure.